Tag Archives: real weddings

Friday’s Feature: Nouman & Shaza’s Mehendi

Finally, it’s time! I am so happy to be able to share these pictures with all of you. It has been hard selecting pictures since there are so many but I finally sat down to do it. Our mehendi was so much fun – I wish I could go back! Without further ado, check out the pictures below that were taken by our photographer, Big Al Studios.

Details:
For the decor, I wanted to keep everything simple. I am in love with tents so that is all that I had wanted for the stage.

My outfit was mainly emerald green with accents of magenta and navy blue. My parents and sisters wore the reverse colours of me – mainly magenta or navy blue. Both the males and females on my side wore navy blue – the men were provided with turquoise dupatta’s. Nouman’s family gave beige kurta’s to all the boys and turquoise dupatta’s aswell. Nouman’s male cousins all wore white. Nouman wore a brown kurta with a beige shalwar and dupatta.

Therefore, the decor matched the above colours. The tent was mainly green with panels of navy blue, turquoise and magenta. I did not want an overtly pink look – I preferred to have the blue’s and greens more prominent. The tablecloth and chair covers were gold with turquoise overlays for the tables and navy/royal blue napkins.

Some of the hors d’oeuvre and appetizers

Decor

Signing the graffiti wall

Mehendi Thaals:
Nouman’s family had cute trays and candles that they had decorated with flowers and pearl necklaces. I bought most of my stuff from the dollar store – with the exception of a few pieces from Pakistan. My side had: flower baskets, lanterns, colourful candleholders, a tray with small bowls filled with mehendi, ubtan and toothpicks (from Pakistan), a decorated mehendi plate from Pakistan with 2 paans (leaves) that my mom had attached gota to, velvet paisley and glitter trays, 2 trays of chooriyan covered with velvet fabric, a green coloured platter from Pakistan full of fruits, a basket full of nuts from the Middle East and a tray with Nouman’s flower haar (garland).

I bought flower baskets and the lantern for my cousins

Flower baskets and lanterns for my cousins – Dollar Store. We filled the baskets with rose petals

With the exception of the candleholders (top right), everything is from Nouman’s side. I bought the candleholders from the Dollar Store

My mom, sisters and I (mainly my mom) made the velvet paisley trays. I couldn’t find fans when I went to Pakistan. My mom’s mami saved the day and bought the fans for me. The 2 green trays (bottom left) are full of chooriyan – my moms friend made the velvet covers. The tray in the middle has Nouman’s haar.

Nouman’s Entrance:
As he entered behind the girls, the music cut to Brooklyn Go Hard by Jay-Z ft. Santogold. Nouman donned a “NY” hat at the entrance of the hall and then walked to the stage.

Nouman getting ready to make his entrance

The guys dancing

My Entrance:
The doors opened to the first beat of Peer Manava (Black and White). As I walked, I was nervous and excited.

Nouman’s family ready to receive me

Making my entrance

Peeking through my mamoo’s arm

My nerves captured on camera (by the way, look – my nails did grow! Thank you all for the tips)

Rasms:
I had learned from my baat pakki and kept fruits instead of mithai for our feeding. As a result, even though we had a long lineup of people feeding us, I didn’t feel sick.

Top to Bottom: Nouman’s mom tying gajray (flower bracelets) on my hands, Mehendi (henna) on our leaf, the fruit tray that we were fed from

Nouman’s mom putting the mehendi on my leaf

Trying to get in a few words to each other amidst all the chaos

Our Photoshoot:
Most of the pictures below were taken separately before we saw each other. The photoshoot we had of us during dinner was mainly a couples shoot (duh!). The last two pictures in this section are from out photoshoot together.

Nouman’s “getting ready” shots

My turn

Hiding behind my ghoonghat

Striking a pose and being silly

Stuffing my face with cotton candy!

Dholki and Dances:
The most enteratining portion of the night – everybody did a fantastic job. We had seven dances in total – each roughly around 4-5 minutes. My sisters dance was 9 minutes long! Dances were done by: My family friends – Shahab Brothers, Family Friend Girls, Family Friend Boys, My Sisters, Nouman’s brother and sister-in-law, Nouman’s cousin and Nouman and the boys. With the exception of the last dance, all of them used a medley of songs – surprisingly, not a single song overlapped!

The ladies having a blast on the dhol

Nouman’s cousin

Clockwise from Top Left: Girls dance, Shahab brothers, brother and sister-in-law’s and my sisters!

Nouman and the guys dancing to Kolaveri Di

Open dance floor

Dancing the night away

The end.

Looks like we maintained good posture

*All the images used in this post are courtesy of Big Al Studios.*

To read about the Mehendi Day, check out my posts: Mehendi Day – Part 1 and Mehendi Day – Part 2. For information on my makeup, check out my tips for a DIY Mehendi Look.

p.s. If you have not been following me on Facebook or Twitter, you might have been surprised at the blog’s new look. Leave a comment below and let me know what you think – I want to hear your feedback!

Behind The Scenes: The Valima Day

2 Replies

This is the last behind-the-scenes post from the wedding days. Due to alot of requests, the next series will look at post-wedding life. Yup, I’m going there.

The day of the Valima started off good, Alhamdulilah. Nouman and I had set our alarms for 11:00am, giving us plenty of time to shower, get dressed and have breakfast before heading to my hair/makeup appointment. Although we did wake up at 11:00, we lounged around for too long and were rushing out the door to make it to my appointment in time.

Nouman dropped me off and then went off to get dressed himself – my parents had reserved a guest suite in our condo during the wedding so we utilized that. Once I arrived at the salon, I was asked to put on my shirt and then head over to my seat. Shirley was working on another bride so her assistant started on my hair. Shirley had a look at my jewellery and asked me what type of look I wanted. I explained that I wanted a “clean” look - dramatic eyes, natural lips and nothing too heavy/caked on. I had done a dark/bolder look on the shaadi, so I wanted the valima makeup to be a complete contrast. While my makeup was being done, one of my family friends also entered the same area as me to get done up for our valima. We chatted while we were both getting pampered and then Nouman called to say he was ready and outside the room. We allowed him to enter while Shirley finished my makeup. Once I was ready, Shirley pinned my dupatta, Maggie (her sister) put on my chooriyan and Nouman helped me put on my shoes. Then, we were off! Oh yes, I did forget my pants and garment bag. Richard, Shirley’s husband, was kind enough to call me to pick it up. Embarrassing!

That's my younger sister whatsapping chooriyan to me so I could match it to my outfit

That’s my younger sister sending me whatsapp pictures of chooriyan so I could match them to my outfit

We were running approximately 10 minutes late so we rushed to our photoshoot. The entire ride there I kept asking if my lip colour looked okay – I generally prefer bright colours so the neutral lipstick made me question my look. Once we arrived at our photoshoot, we met our photographers, grabbed an umbrella (just incase it rained) and headed off to take pictures. As we walked to our location, passerby’s were clapping, cheering and saying congratulations to us. It was so sweet! Walking through sand was tough but a bride’s got to do what a bride’s got to do for great pictures, right? The photoshoot itself was uneventful – we were used to our photographers by then and at times I could anticipate what they wanted us to do. Towards the end of our photoshoot, we took pictures by the water and then Nouman and I started panicking because we were getting late (again!).

Photography by Big Al Studios

Once we arrived at our Valima hall, Nouman dropped me off to the main entrance so I could go and hide in the bridal room. Obviously, I first had to check the hall and took a peek inside – I loved how everything look! I said salaam to all of Nouman’s family, Nouman had arrived by this time, and then we both went into the bridal room. This is where the wait began, again! We were kept company by Nouman’s cousins and also by our videographer who wanted some “getting ready” footage of us. Nouman also worked on his speech while I ate appetizers.

Before we made our entrance, Nouman’s family was introduced. When it was time, we made our way to the entrance of our hall. Luckily, one of my friends had just arrived so I asked her to fix my train as Nouman and I made our entrance. I felt like a celebrity when we entered – the whole room was on their foot, the music was beating loud and we could hear cheers everywhere. As we walked inside, there were faces everywhere but the faces I was looking for were of my family members. Finally, I saw my family at the front and I waved at them while holding back tears. Yeah, I don’t know what came over me. We had our cake cutting ceremony right after the entrance so that distracted me from crying. Both sets of parents were asked to join us for the cake cutting – Nouman and I had decided to have them by our side for this ceremony. We all hugged, cut the cake and fed it to each other.

Photography by Big Al Studios

After this, we did a mini-photoshoot, watched a slideshow and listened to speeches. We also had the mandatory portrait pictures with our guests. Once all that was done, it was time to get the party started. Nouman’s friends started on the dance floor and after around 15-20 minutes, we were finally able to break free from everyone and get onto the dance floor too!

The entire night was fun and upbeat – something we both wanted. For me, the highlight of the night was when Nouman danced to me on Michael Jackson’s The Way You Make Me Feel.

Photography by Big Al Studios

I was totally pooped and tired by the time we were ready to leave. Thankfully, we saved ourselves the 1 hour drive back to the east end because we were staying at my parents house. My parents had booked a guest suite so we crashed there once we were home.

The next morning, Nouman and I dressed up and went upstairs for brunch with my family. It was a houseful and the last time I would see my uncles and aunts before they headed back to the US. Spending time with my family felt good – I even got to Skype with my khala in Pakistan. My nani didn’t attend my wedding but that morning, I wore an outfit that she had asked me to wear when I had gone to do my wedding shopping in Pakistan.